Tesco is in the midst of a huge “Big Price Drop” campaign and one of the new elements they’ve rolled out is the use of Blippar’s Image Recgonition / Augmented Reality technology to bring their ads to life via iPhones, iPads and all sorts of Android devices.

The Augmented Reality print ads launch an animated version of the ad, and provide an extra level of interactivity helping you to find the closest store, view recipe ideas related to the products in each ad and other store information. Would love to hear your thoughts on this one? Good, Bad, Not sure?

[...] Augmented Reality in Print Advertising rn Tesco is in the midst of a huge “Big Price Drop” campaign and one of the new elements they’ve rolled out is the use of Blippar’s Image Recgonition / Augmented Reality technology to bring their ads to life via iPhones, iPads and all sorts of Android devices. DigitalBuzz [...]

This is utter crap. There is no incentive for the consumer to use the AR. If they could see more special deals or something, that would be cool. Without a good reason to get out your phone or tablet, AR is absolutely useless.

As much as I admire a big brand such as Tesco trying something new, I can’t help feel that the idea is actually lacking any real imagination. There are a few things fundamentally wrong with the concept:

1. I’m looking at news in a paper, but have my iPad close at hand… WTF? Why wouldn’t I just be reading the news on my iPad?

2. I’ve gone to all that trouble of opening the app, holding it up and all I get is a recipe? Are you kidding me?! There’s apps full of them already, what makes a Tesco one so special.

3. The microsite that the consumer is led to is uninspiring and with no ‘bells and whistles’ attached to it, comes across as rather static don’t you think?

If anything, the campaign will at least open more people up to the BlipAR app, which can only be a good thing for other brands looking to use the technology in the future. But please, use it more wisely than this!

Have to agree with Griffinabox. After taking time out from reading the paper to interact with an ad I’d feel a little let down after using this.
If it was competition based you could justify it but what it offers is superfluous. It looks like someone in the Tesco marketing department walked in to a meeting and said “we should do one of those augmented reality things”. Everyone nodded, it was pushed through without any real creative thought, this happened.

its great to see some movement on these ads but why ask someone to use their phone to view falling items, it doesn’t add to the static copy.

They need to create something which makes it interactive, relevant and/ or exclusive. For example an incredibly simple concept would be that you can catch one item per ad/ phone and for doing that you get an additional price drop, can like it and link to a recipe that you can use that item in.

They should reward people for going that extra mile by using their phone to view the ad and make better use of technology if they are going to invest in it.

It’s ridiculous – it’s using the AR technology just for the sake of using AR technology and not really giving the consumer anything special for all of that effort (yes, effort – “Wait, let me stop reading the paper to pick up my iPhone or iPad, open the app”…blah blah blah)

Why not just give them a QR code? At least that makes more sense.

At some point, people will understand how to really use AR (and it’s not in a print ad).

Agree with most of the comments here and also agree that AR needs a real purpose to add value.

But what everyone is failing to note is the real lack of commercial value this piece gives the brand.

What benefit does a recipe or nearest store give me if I’m a commuter on the train reading the paper. Nothing!

Now if after reading about their huge “Big Price Drop” I could scan the ad and be taken straight through to purchase and delivery, so that when I get home at the end of the day I have massively discounted products waiting for me… That is a real reason to be!

[...] recently we have seen some really nice examples of it being used in the mainstream by the likes of Tesco and VW. This week however, we were particularly impressed by Blippar’s showcase – using object [...]